By Cesare Milanti / info@eurohoops.net
MANILA, Philippines – Despite losing against Italy, Serbia bounced back by destroying the Dominican Republic, also thanks to Nikola Milutinov’s performance of 16 points and 5 rebounds with 7/8 from the field, qualifying for the 2023 FIBA World Cup Quarter-Finals against Lithuania.
Talking to the media on the eve of the game against the Baltic side, the 28-year-old center believes their opponents will have a favorite status coming into the encounter. “Lithuania is a really good team, they showed it in the last game by how they played against the United States. It’s gonna be really tough for us, they are playing really physically, with high energy. We have to match it, they are favorites in the game”, he said.
“In my opinion, it won’t be a game with a lot of points scored. But we will see what tomorrow brings. They’re gonna forget the victory and come here with full confidence, to play an ever better game”, he went on saying about the clash with the Lithuanian national team.
One of the most interesting matchups will be between him and Jonas Valanciunas on the glass. “It’s gonna be tough, we have to play team defense against him, not only 1 on 1. We have to prepare for him, for Motiejunas. They have a lot of quality in the squad”, he added before going back to his matchup against Karl-Anthony Towns. “He’s an amazing player, it was a good experience to play against him”, he commented about the Minnesota Timberwolves center.
Serbia had to also go through what happened with Borisa Simanic, who had to undergo urgent surgeries to remove his kidney. “It was really tough for us when we heard what happened. At first, we didn’t believe it. Such a bad thing, but it really affected us. We’re praying for him to be good as soon as possible. Last night we heard he had to undergo another surgery, We are all with him and we’re praying for him to be okay as fast as possible”, Milutinov added about his national team teammate.
“We’re gonna try to fight for him and at least to make him a little bit proud. It was really tough, we didn’t sleep after that game. We were trying to find blood for him, he was losing a lot. It was a really tough moment for anybody, I hope this will never happen to anybody in the world. I didn’t believe something like that could happen. To have this kind of injury in a basketball game really is a disaster”, the Serbian center added.
Heading into the knockout stage of the 2023 FIBA World Cup, the newest Olympiacos center is almost averaging a double-double with 14.0 points and 9.6 rebounds per game, shooting 71.1% from two and 88.9% at the free throw line.
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